Saturday morning brought another winter storm. I was sad our brunch was canceled but happy to stay home and cozy.
My sister and I made plans to meet up at packet pick up later in the afternoon- once the weather had abated.
We were in and out in moments which felt a little anti-climatic. We made plans to meet at her house in the morning and then said our good byes. Only to bump into each other at Aldi minutes later. So we did our grocery shopping together. 😂
In the evening Rhett and I went to the high school production of Les Misérables.... Hannah was on stage crew and all the kids did a phenomenal job. I'm not even a big fan of Les Mis and was having a hard time following but I can appreciate the hard work and passion that went into it. And three days later I'm still humming the songs :P
Finally home for the evening I set about deciding what to wear for the Half in the morning. The weather app was projecting about 14 degrees at start time much to my chagrin. After much debate I decided on a long sleeve top, my jacket, my birthday T on top. Fleece lined black running leggings. A fleece head band and hat and gloves.
Immediately after snapping this picture Bruno snatched my socks and ran away. Chance and I gave chase and cornered him in the living room after running upstairs, downstairs and all around the house.
I piled all my race stuff on the kitchen table. Set my alarm for 5 am and went to bed.
Bruno woke me up at 4 am to be let out. I laid on the couch for as long as possible afterword until I finally had to get ready to leave. I choked down half a bagel with peanut butter and honey- feeling nauseously anxious.
I drove to Laura's in the early morning dark. The moon was huge and bright. I wish I had been able to take a picture. I arrived at Laura's hung out with the nephews for a few minutes while she finished getting ready and then we anxiously headed into Syracuse. There was a pretty long line of cars arriving at the race and it took awhile but we made it. We didn't remember having to wait so long before. Once inside the convention center we quickly found our brother and sister in law. Chatted for a bit, made one last stop at the restroom and headed out into the cold to line up at the start.
Laura planned to run with me the whole time and be my dedicated race photographer. Our goal to have fun and enjoy the day.
We were on our way. In the first mile Laura told me about a book she had just listened too
The Power of Fun- somewhere in this book it talked about seeking Delight and recognizing things that sparked delight by pointing at them as declaring "Delight!" She said we were going to do that on our run. Keep our eyes open for all the little things that brought us JOY and declare them out loud. So we did. And it was pretty fun.
The roads were not good. There were lots that were ice/snow covered and/or slushy. Our feet were soaked. Some where around 5K I gave up on my glasses- they fogged up and even though I can barely see without them- I could see better than with them.
It felt so, so hard given the condition of the roads. The sun was out and felt glorious. I took delight in that. But over all I was starting to feel discouraged.
Approaching a corner there was a car playing the Rocky theme. This song now always reminds me of my first half in Pittsburgh. This song was playing as I ran across one of the bridges and I vividly remember it. The music, feeling happy and strong running across that bridge. Unbeknownst to me- my family was also at that spot and saw me. My Dad told me later how impressed he was by how strong I looked.
I did not feel strong, I felt tired and discouraged and started struggling to not burst into tears.
I felt disheartened as we crossed the 10K timing mat knowing we were going much slower than I hoped. Knowing there was no chance of a PR and a pretty good chance it was going to be closing in on 3 hours before we finished.
My sister tried to bolster me. We found some more moments of delight.
We were over halfway!
She took my picture running under the 7 mile marker.
One such moment of delight was a lady running near us who stopped and came back to pet a dog, the dog rolled over in the snow for belly rubs. DELIGHT! We also were so thankful and took such delight in the race volunteers, police officers who kept us safe and spectators. One group jumped up and down a
SCREAMED HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMY!!!
One lady who we played cat and mouse with for a few miles, as we passed her yet again said you girls are crushing it! I did not feel I was crushing anything. I wanted to be having fun but I so was not. I was tired, my hips hurt. My right baby toe hurt. My shoes felt wet and squishy. I just wanted it to be over.
Mile 10 actually felt like it went by pretty quickly weirdly. I felt like were in the final stretch and focused on just moving forward.
Then we made that final right turn. I could see a blue and green haze that I was fairly confident was the finish line. I could hear the announcer and pushed speeding up, just wanting to be across that finish line.
The lady who handed me my medal grinned and said "Happy Birthday and Congratulations!" 🎉
We had done it!
We finished!
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My finish line chocolate milk. 💖
Perfection and Delight! |
Here's my final results. I'm still working on feeling happy and proud. It was a hard run. I did it. I completed 13.1 miles on my 44 birthday with one of my favorite people in the whole world. So that is something to be happy and proud of. I finished running 13 miles before my youngest child was even out of bed :P
Back home the kids were all there to celebrate my birthday. We had pizza and wings for dinner and it hit the spot. My birthday cake even matched my race medal!
We then spent the afternoon playing a game with much laughter. (Delight!) My heart was filled to overflowing.
